Data operations such as read and write operations are commonly performed by all computers. Further, data operations can be combined to perform specialized data operations such as data backup. In particular, continuous data protection (CDP) refers to the backup of computer data by immediately saving a copy of every change made to data automatically, instead of scheduling periodic backups.
Upon installation of a backup product such as CDP, a full backup is performed. Once the full backup is completed, the CDP product then performs a backup of any incremental change made to the data. Typically, the backup product is deployed simultaneously to a large number of users within an enterprise and all of the users within the enterprise share the same backup target storage location. Accordingly, the network may become overloaded during the full backup process. When the network becomes overloaded the full backup process can take an extended period of time, such as multiple weeks, to complete. The most critical data to an enterprise is commonly the data that is most recently accessed, and/or changed. Thus, during the full backup process, any changes that occur to this most critical data are not be backed up until the lengthy full backup process is complete.